Working with VDT proved to be an experience not to be forgotten professionally and humanely.
The excitement to be reprising a very substantial role in the piece Broken Chords surpassed the nerves of thinking I was going back to a full length piece (after a few years of easier performing). I was so hungry to go back into a studio and work solidly. The role could not have been more complete and rewarding, two duets with lots of partnering, solo work and a long monologue…I was walking on air and thinking this is a major part and the more I watched the video the more I venerated the woman who created the role.
From my first meeting with Charlotte and the company I had generally a very positive feeling of the people I was going to start work with. It got even better as the days went on - from rehearsing in Sheffield (a city that felt familiar as soon as I was there, maybe it’s the 7 hills that it shares with Rome! I loved its mixture of old and new and appreciated the calmer pace of life compared to London) up to the tour, which was like being on a school trip with the advantage of adulthood.
The company’s organisational team were very efficient, answering queries and providing us with information ahead of time, and making us feel welcome form the very beginning. A big thanks.
Working on Broken Chords was intense and full on while learning the material simply because it was a lot in quantity, and there is often an uncomfortable passage during a process of learning other people’s steps from a video. You think you get the steps but actually you get a skeleton and then you have to fill that with meat and find a kinesthetic sense of the movement. I was however lucky to be given many tips by Charlotte who had previously danced the role.
The partnering was where I could let go the most in the show and the trust between myself and Janusz felt so rooted that the challenge of making a connection work became quite soon in the tour a fearless fulfillment.
Text in Broken Chords was an opportunity to search and find more to bring out of myself. A difference between the original cast member and myself manifested itself the most here for me. This character could ramble on (and make sense) and I had to rely on the lines to do so as I’m naturally a calmer and quieter being. On the fifth (alas the last) performance I felt the text more mine, the realisation of holding the audiences’ attention and actually living those minutes of addressing them is something I hope to experience more of. In fact, unlike some members of the company who have performed this piece for a number of years, I feel I just had a taste of it.
I found American and Canadian audiences generally enthusiastic.
A standing ovation in Canada was a pleasant response, but so was a comment of frustrated audience member watching IWGO. I too was watching the show in the audience that night and found it extraordinary that the guy, though blatantly not amused, had gotten into his own rebellious dialogue with the pieces’ questionings.
Both Broken Chords and If We Go On are in my opinion the result of intelligent ensemble work and I relate and admire Charlotte’s way of looking at live performance. Personally what I love the most about these two works is the humour, it’s crucial!
